Although, the popularity of SUVs are increasing in India, only a small portion of these buyers actually opt for a proper SUV. Even those who opt for a 4×4 or AWD SUV do not explore the full potential of these SUVs. Off-roading is still a trend that is not very popular among Indians. We have several off-road or SUV owners group who often arrange such off-road events with proper guidance from experts. Here we have one such video where a Mahindra Thar and the new generation Land Rover Defender are seen attempting a technical climb.
The video has been uploaded by Anshuman Bishnoi on his YouTube channel. This was actually an obstacle where the SUVs had to crawl up a rocky surface. The current generation Mahindra Thar was the first SUV to attempt the climb. As this was a steep climb, driver cannot actually see where the vehicle is actually going. A spotter is also seen in the video guiding the driver to turn vehicle to avoid any rocks that can stop SUVs from moving forward.
Also read: Buying a pre-owned Mahindra Thar is better than buying a new one: 5 reasons
Mahindra Thar smoothly crawled up the first section and in the second section, the spotter asked driver to turn the vehicle a bit to the left to avoid a boulder and then after couple of trials, the Mahindra Thar cleared and smoothly crawled up the climb.
Next it was Land Rover Defender’s turn. When compared to Mahindra Thar, Defender is a massive SUV. The one seen here is a Defender 110 which comes with longer wheelbase. Just like Mahindra Thar, Defender also cleared the first stretch of the climb quite smoothly and after that, it started struggling. The boulder which Thar avoided was coming in the way of Defender because of its longer wheelbase.
The conditions were wet and that was not helping either. The wheels started losing traction. Defender’s ground clearance was increased for this climb but, that did not help in any way. Although the tyres used on Defender were All-Terrain, the SUV could not climb over the boulder and clear the obstacle. It kept of loosing traction and finally was slowly taken down to levelled ground in reverse.
Other cars like Old-gen Toyota Fortuner and Pajero Sport also tried the same obstacle and had failed. It was only the current generation Mahindra Thar that did the climb. The reason behind it is its size itself. Mahindra Thar is the smallest SUV in the group and it has a shorter wheelbase and had better breakover angle. It is also lighter than the Land Rover Defender. All these factors helped it along with the mechanically locking differential.
Defender on the other hand had a longer wheelbase which made things harder for the driver and it is hard to squeeze such a long SUV into tight spaces. The size, weight and no differential locks at the rear all worked against the Defender. This does not mean Defender is a bad SUV by any means. Land Rover Defender is an extremely capable SUV and is powered by a 3.0 litre diesel, 2.0 litre petrol or a 3.0 litre petrol engine option. Mahindra Thar is offered with a 2.0 litre turbo petrol and 2.2 litre turbo diesel engine option with 4×4 as standard.
Also read: All New Tata Safari: Can a tall adult comfortably sleep in it? (Video)
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